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Scholarships that target students interested in engineering provide an excellent way to help pay for the rising costs of higher education. Since engineering scholarships are plentiful and come from a variety of sources, such as corporations, non-profits, foundations, institutions, and governmental bodies, future engineers have a host of opportunities available to them.

Hate playing scales or doing fitness drills? In the not-so-distant future, the hours of repetitive practice necessary to learn a musical instrument, new sport, or dance may be a relic of the past. Lara Boyd, a researcher at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, believes a promising new technology called magnetic brain stimulation could cut the practice time required to learn a new motor skill.

Combining nanotechnology with foam, Brigham Young University engineering student Jake Merrell has created a “smart foam” that could be placed inside the helmets of football players to measure the impact of hits to the head, and help prevent concussions.

Sudden infant death syndrome, or crib death, is responsible in the United States for around 2,225 deaths a year of children from birth to 12 months. But German researchers have developed a stretchable, printed circuit board that could be fitted into a one-piece sleeper and would signal an alarm if a baby stops breathing. Investigators at the Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration IZM in Berlin have figured out how to make the flexible, wearable circuit board from polyurethane, a plastic often used as a sealant. They fitted it with sensors that monitor breathing in the chest and stomach areas, and ironed it onto baby-size PJs.

Attention Iron Man fans. Powered suits of armor like the one designed by fictional industrialist/engineer Tony Stark may soon save or improve the lives of real people. In 2011, a motorized exoskeleton created by engineering students at the University of California, Berkeley allowed classmate Austin Whitney to walk across the stage to receive his diploma. Now, English athlete Claire Lomas is making medical history as the first paraplegic to use an exoskeleton to get around home and town.